Monday, May 11, 2009

How to Unanswer E-mails!

Bill Brown  ...  Xiamen University
Ever struggled about whether you should reply to that e-mail or letter, or wait a bit--or toss it?  In "The Wisdom of America," Lin Yutang quoted a delightful essay On Unanswering Letters, published back in 1928, long before people were deluged with daily letters, e-mail, and SPAM. 

Ironically, the fellow in the essay who wrote the unanswered letter was named "Bill."  Do you think that was a hint for me.  If so, jot me a line and I'll get back to you--about Thanksgiving or Christmas.

On Unanswering Letters,
by Christopher Morley, from Essays, 1928, J.B. Lippincott Company
(Quoted in The Wisdom of America, pp. 250-253) 

There are a great many people who really believe in answering letters the day they are received, just as there are people who go to the movies at nine o clock in the morning; but these people are stunted and queer.

It is a great mistake. Such crass and breathless promptness takes away a great deal of the pleasure of correspondence.

The psychological didoes involved in receiving letters and making up one s mind to answer them are very complex. If the tangled process could be clearly analyzed and its component involutions isolated for inspection we might reach a clearer comprehension of that curious bag of tricks, the efficient Masculine Mind.

Take Bill F., for instance, a man so delightful that even to contem plate his existence puts us in good humor and makes us think well of a world that can exhibit an individual equally comely in mind, body and estate. Every now and then we get a letter from Bill, and immediately we pass into a kind of trance, in which our mind rapidly enunciates the ideas, thoughts, surmises and contradictions that we would like to write to him in reply. We think what fun it would be to sit right down and churn the ink-well, spreading speculation and cynicism over a number of sheets of foolscap to be wafted Billward.

Sternly we repress the impulse for we know that the shock to Bill of getting so immediate a retort would surely unhinge the well-fitted panels of his intellect.

We add his letter to the large delta of unanswered mail on our desk, taking occasion to turn the mass over once or twice and run through it in a brisk, smiling mood, thinking of all the jolly letters we shall write some day.

After Bill's letter has lain on the pile for a fortnight or so it has been gently silted over by about twenty other pleasantly postponed manuscripts. Coming upon it by chance, we reflect that any specific problems raised by Bill in that manifesto will by. this time have settled themselves. And his random speculations upon household management and human destiny will probably have taken a new slant by now, so that to answer his letter in its own tune will not be congruent with his present fevers. We had better bide a wee until we really have some thing o circumstance to impart.

We wait a week.

By this time a certain sense of shame has begun to invade the privacy of our brain. We feel that to answer that letter now would be an indelicacy. Better to pretend that we never got it. By and bye Bill will write again and then we will answer promptly. We put the letter back in the middle of the heap and think what a fine chap Bill is. But he knows we love him, so it doesn t really matter whether we write or not.

Another week passes by, and no further communication from Bill. We wonder whether he does love us as much as we thought. Still we are too proud to write and ask.

A few days later a new thought strikes us. Perhaps Bill thinks we have died and he is annoyed because he wasn*t invited to the funeral, Ought we to wire him? No, because after all we are not dead, and even if he thinks we are, his subsequent relief at hearing the good news of our survival will outweigh his bitterness during the interval. One of these days we will write him a letter that will really express our heart, filled with all the grindings and gear-work of our mind, rich in affection and fallacy. But we had better let it ripen and mellow for a while. Letters, like wines, accumulate bright fumes and bubblings if kept under cork.

Presently we turn over that pile of letters again. We find in the lees of the heap two or three that have gone for six months and can safely be destroyed. Bill is still on our mind, but in a pleasant, dreamy kind of way* He does not ache or twinge us as he did a month ago. It is fine to have old friends like that and keep in touch with them. We wonder how he is and whether he has two children or three. Splendid old Bill!

By this time we have written Bill several letters in imagination and enjoyed doing so, but the matter of sending him an actual letter has begun to pall. The thought no longer has the savour and vivid sparkle it had once. When one feels like that it is unwise to write. Letters should be spontaneous outpourings: they should never be undertaken merely from a sense of duty. We know that Bill wouldn t want to get a letter that was dictated by a feeling of obligation.

Another fortnight or so elapsing, it occurs to us that we have entirely forgotten what Bill said to us in that letter. We take it out and con it over. Delightful fellow! It is full of his own felicitous kinks of whim, though some of it sounds a little old-fashioned by now- It seems a bit stale, has lost some of its freshness and surprise. Better not answer it just yet, for Christmas will soon be here and we shall have to write then anyway. We wonder, can Bill hold out until Christmas without a letter?

We have been rereading some of those imaginary letters to Bill that have been dancing in our head. They are full of all sorts of fine stuff. If Bill ever gets them he will know how we love him. To use O. Henry s immortal joke, we have days of Damon and Knights of Pythias writing those uninked letters to Bill A curious thought has come to us. Perhaps it would be better if we never saw Bill again. It is very difficult to talk to a man when you Eke him so much. It is much easier to write in the sweet fantastic strain. We are so inarticulate when face to face. If Bill comes to town, we will leave word that we have gone away. Good old Bill! He will always be a precious memory.

A few days later a sudden frenzy sweeps over us, and though we have many pressing matters on hand, we mobilize pen and paper and literary shock troops and prepare to hurl several battalions at BilL But, strangely enough, our utterance seems stilted and stiff. We have nothing to say. My dear Bill, we begin, it seems a long time since we heard from you. Why don t you write? We still love you, in spite of all your shortcomings.

That doesn t seem very cordial. We muse over the pen and nothing comes. Bursting with affection, we are unable to say a word.

Just then the phone rings. "Hello?"we say.

It is Bill, come to town unexpectedly.

"Good old fish!" we cry, ecstatic. "Meet you at the corner of Tenth and Chestnut in five minutes."

We tear up the unfinished letter. Bill will never know how much we love him. Perhaps it is just as well. It is very embarrassing to have your friends know how you feel about them. When we meet him we will be a little bit on our guard. It would not be well to be betrayed into any extravagance of cordiality.

And perhaps a not altogether false little story could be written about a man who never visited those most dear to him, because it hurt him so to say good-bye when he had to leave.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

The Mother of Mother's Day

Bill Brown  ...  Xiamen University
 Happy Mother's Day from Amoy!
  I wrote this article for Common Talk in 2006.

When Anna May Jarvis's mother died on the second Sunday of May 1906, Anna May wished she had heeded the warning to, “Lavish your flowers on the living, not the dead.” Driven by remorse, the gentle, easy going Anna May became obsessed with the desire to see her mother and motherhood honored throughout the world.

After a year’s planning, the first Mother's Day was celebrated on the second anniversary of her mother’s death, May 10, 1908, at St. Andrew’s Methodist Church in Grafton, West Virginia, where Anna’s mother had taught Sunday School. A year later, Philadelphia became the first city to proclaim an official Mother’s Day. Three years later, in 1914, President Woodrow Wilson signed Public Resolution 25, establishing the second Sunday of each May as Mother's Day. And then, to everyone’s surprise, Anna May retired and spent the remaining 34 years of her life, and her fortune of over 100,000 dollars, fighting against Mother’s Day!

The problem was that from day one, Mother’s Day had become a great commercial extravaganza to boost the incomes of card and candy makers, and a salve to soothe the consciences of those who each May made mother a “queen for the day” but neglected her the other 364 days.

Anna May complained, “Mother’s Day has nothing to do with candy. Candy is junk. A maudlin, insincere printed card or a ready-made telegram means nothing except that you’re too lazy to write to the woman who has done more for you than anyone else in the world. You ought to go home and see your mother on Mother’s Day. You ought to take her out and paint the town red...You ought to give her something useful, something permanent...Is she sleeping warm at night? Could she use an eiderdown? Maybe the stairs in her home need fixing...”

For 30 years, Anna May fought for the integrity of Mother’s Day. She finally died in a sanitarium — old, tired, deaf, blind, penniless, and having never married nor been a mother herself!

Sixty years later, mothers may be more neglected than ever. Statistics show one half of Americans, which of course includes one half of our mothers, live in poverty. Where are the children? More than ever, mothers deserve more than cards and candy one day a year and anonymity the other 364.

My appreciation of motherhood only began as I watched my wife, Susan Marie, in both sickness and health, unselfishly spend herself on her two sons (and her husband as well!). I also slowly came to better appreciate my own mother, and though she’s 12,000 miles away, I am now careful to not only send her the obligatory Mother’s Day card and flowers but also to regularly write and phone her.

Fortunately, most Common Talk readers are not 12,000 miles away from home! So as Mother's Day catches on in China, let us seek to make Mother’s Day not a card-and-candy substitute for well-deserved love but the crown and pinnacle of a full year’s expression of love and appreciation for the one who gave us life: our mother.
www.amoymagic.com

Thursday, May 7, 2009

Princeton Premier Business Leaders and Professionals Honors Edition

Bill Brown   ...  Xiamen University
For years I've been getting invitations for "Who's Who in -- Fill in the Blanks," and countless Chinese versions of such "honors," but today I received this one from "Princeton."  Pretty impressive--except as far as I can tell it really has nothing to do with Princeton.   It is just a scam to get you to spend $100 nonrefundable to be included.  But some Chinese colleagues are so excited about these frauds and think they're the ticket to fame and fortune abroad.

As Groucho Marx said in his oft-repeated quip, "I would not join any organization that would take me as a member."

Below is the entire letter, but for the record--I think none of these are worth the money they charge you, even if they're legitimate.  In High School I paid for the "Who's Who" volume with me in it, and the "Outstanding American High School Students", and a couple others.  My parents were very excited about them and did not want to miss the chance to get them.  But what prospective employer or school really cares?  These "directories" go by information you send them, and as far as I know do not verify anything. If I were a university or a prospective employer, I'd go by a resume that I could verify rather than a commercial "honors" directory.

Don't waste your money!

Dear Bill,
It is my pleasure to inform you that you are being considered for inclusion into the 2009-2010 Princeton Premier Business Leaders and Professionals Honors Edition section of the registry.
The 2009-2010 edition of the registry will include biographies of the world's most accomplished individuals. Recognition of this kind is an honor shared by thousands of executives and professionals throughout the world each year. Inclusion is considered by many as the single highest mark of achievement.
You may access our application form using the following link:
http://www.formdesk.com/pgn6/New
Upon final confirmation, you will be listed among other accomplished individuals in the Princeton Premier Registry.

For accuracy and publication deadlines, please complete your application form and return it to us within five business days.
There is no cost to be included in the registry.
If you've already received this email from us, there is no need to respond again.
This email serves as our final invitation to potential members who have not yet responded.
On behalf of the Executive Publisher, we wish you continued success.
Sincerely,
Jason Harris

Managing Director
Princeton Premier


Princeton Premier
23-35A Steinway St - Astoria, NY 11105 - USA


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Saturday, May 2, 2009

Chinese vs. American Culture

Bill Brown ... Xiamen University
I've been asked to lecture at a Chinese high school in Xiamen about the differences between Chinese and American culture, so below, and in a few following blogs, will be some rough drafts of my thoughts so far.
Any suggestions or additions? Please add them in the comments! I have a week to pull this together...

Differences between Chinese & American Culture

The longer I live in China, the more I realize that the difference between Chinese culture and American culture is—everything! From use of color to how we cook, from body language to body space, we are not just separate cultures but different planets. But fortunately, most of this is on the social level. Individually, we are very similar indeed, with the same needs, hopes, and fears as any other peoples on the planet. So I believe that the day will come when East does meet West—though it may not be in my lifetime.

There are so many issues in which we differ, so for this talk I will focus on just a few that many of us would assume are universal, such as views on body space and privacy, importance of family and patriotism, value of education and view of teachers, use of time and history, use of color, cooking and dining, and a little about Chinese and American humor. Of course, I may not be the right one to write this. My wife Susan Marie says I have no culture whatsoever. She’s probably right—but at least I have class. In fact, I have 12 hours of class a week in the MBA Program. Personally, I never expected to have so many classes in a classless society.

Part 1. Chinese & American Cooking & Dining
“With English cooking you boil the chicken, throw away the water and eat the chicken. With Chinese cooking you boil the chicken, throw away the carcass and drink the soup.” Anonymous

“One should eat to live, not live to eat.” Moliere

“Moliere never ate Chinese food.”
Bill Brown

I once joked that Adam and Eve could not have been Chinese because if they’d been Chinese, Eve would have tossed the apple and eaten the snake. But an Overseas Chinese friend said, “Not true! If she’d been Chinese, she’d have sold the apple, and then eaten the snake.”

Chinese seem to live for food, and spend much of their day preparing or eating dishes that are a feast for both palate and eyes—and things I never could have imagined people would eat. I eventually learned that Chinese eat anything edible, and if it isn’t edible, they call it medicine and ingest it anyway.

In N.W. Fujian they boast about noodles made from the flour of a very poisonous tuber. “Takes 18 steps to make it safe,” my host told me. I asked him how many people died on steps 1 to 17.

And birds nests! Just who thought of crawling up the side of a cliff into a cave to steal bird’s nest made of solidified swallow spit—and then cooking it? And in China I think I’ve eaten every part of a chicken, cow or pig except the meat itself. Chinese will fuss over a tiny morsel of meat that’s smaller than some of the bits I fish out of my mouth with a toothpick after the meal. If they do give you meat, it’s chopped up small—and chock full of sharp little bones. Personally, I think it’s all a front, carried out on a national level, and after foreign guests leave the room, the Chinese bring out the steaks and chops (and probably knives and forks as well).

The hardest thing to get used to is how long Chinese take to eat. At one of our first three-hour 20-course meals in China, my oldest son, who was only five, said, “This is certainly not fast food—it’s slow food.” For Chinese, meals are a social event. For Americans, meals are a pitstop for refueling. Quite often, we just swallow our meal whole and then chew it later.

www.amoymagic.com

Lin Yutang on the Futility of Force

Bill Brown ... Xiamen University
In 1943, in his book "Between Tears and Laughter," Lin Yutang angered friends and foes alike by candidly laying bare the true motives behind the wars and the political machinations going on around the planet. And by the simple expediency of analyzing what the "Powers" had been doing, Lin was able to predict exactly what those same Powers would be doing half a century later.

Though Christ said, "Blessed are the peacemakers," I am skeptical of the motives of some who cry peace, peace (Herr Hitler cried peace even as he sharpened his swords]. But like Lin Yutang, I also do not feel it is unpatriotic or unChristian to question the motives of those resorting to war for the cause of peace.

The following excerpt from Lin Yutang's Between Tears and Laughter is, I think, even more poignant today, over 60 years after it was written. Download the entire book at Internet Archives, and as you read it, note the parallels with much of what we see today. In particular--note how Lin predicted we would rebuild Japan, and why.

Lin Yutang on the Futility of Force

Who will make plain to the world the law of the spirit, and demonstrate that Force generates Coercion, Coercion generates Fear, and Fear generates Hatred, as definitely and as accurately as one billiard ball sends another rolling? Who will write a philosophy and psychology of Force and its reactions and determine their characteristics ? Who will be the consummate fatalist to tell the world in plain, convincing, forceful terms that actions generate emotions and emotions in turn generate actions, that the fruit of Force is Fear and Hatred, that thoroughgoing Force generates Fear and Hatred and unthoroughgoing Force generates Hatred without Fear? Who will say, even as in a classroom in physics, that the greater the Force, the greater the Hatred, and that the greatest Force is the most hated of all?
And who will say, as clearly as the prophets of the sky say that a thunderclap presages a storm, that Force is inevitably followed by Hatred, and Hatred is followed by Revenge? For Hatred divides, and the structure of power must sooner or later fall.

In ignorance of such simple and self-evident moral laws, Pericles alternately threatened by force and cajoled by oratory the other Greek states. And after his death, Cleon the leather merchant, Eucrates the rope-seller, and Hyperbolus the lampmaker babbled. They were all good democrats and Cleon was a good general It was left only for the insolent public idol, Alcibiades, to complete the suicide of Greece.

But such laws, being the laws of God, are manifest to the mind of the simple man, requiring no proof. Therefore, he who would be strong within must guard against the use of power, for only then is he safe from corruption within and hatred without. And only he who is free from corruption within and hatred without can be strong eternally. Laotse says, "For love is victorious in attack and invulnerable in defense. Heaven arms with love those it would not see destroyed." Therefore he says:
Of all things, soldiers are instruments of evil, Hated by men. Therefore the religious man avoids them. Soldiers are weapons of evil; They are not the weapons of the gentleman. When the use of soldiers cannot be helped, The best policy is calm restraint. Even in victory, there is no beauty, And who calls it beautiful Is one who delights in slaughter. He who delights in slaughter Will not succeed in his ambition to rule the world. The slaying of multitudes should be mourned with sorrow. A victory should be celebrated with the Funeral Rite. Those who love America and England and wish them to be strong forever must read Laotse again and again, for they will gain thereby the secret of immortal strength, exempt from corruption within and invulnerable from attack without. Let America be great, even as the great river of life: The Great Tao flows everywhere, (Like a flood) it may go left or right The myriad things derive their life from it, And it does not deny them. When its work is accomplished, It does not take possession. It clothes and feeds the myriad things, Yet does not claim them as its own... Because to the end it does not claim greatness, Its greatness is achieved. How did the great rivers and seas become the Lords of the Ravines ? By being good at keeping low. That was how they became the Lords of the Ravines. Therefore in order to be the chief among the people, One must speak like their inferiors. In order to be foremost among the people, One must walk behind them. Thus it is that the sage stays above, And the people do not feel his weight; Walks in front, And the people do not wish him harm. Then the people of the world are glad to uphold him forever. Because he does not contend, No one in the world can contend against him. I am not worried lest America may not be able to assert a leadership of force and power; I am worried lest she may. I am concerned to see America assume a moral leadership, a leadership of humility, so that the world may pay her glad homage and uphold her forever. Like the great river that nourishes life along its valley, she shall by the exuberance and richness of her life be a blessing upon the peoples of the earth. She shall stay above, and the world shall not feel her weight; she shall walk in front and no one will wish her harm. For she shall then lead in kindness and unselfishness and justice and by that secret of unused power bring a new era of brotherhood to mankind. No one can dethrone her because of her power for goodness, and no one can take away from her, because she does not take possession, She shall not contend, and no one in the world can contend against her, and because she takes no credit, the credit can never be taken away from her. This is my Dream America. Will it come true? Man has done it before. Abraham Lincoln did it. George Washington did it. In a world of evil chaos, great men have stood up and with the strength of their goodness and their simplicity and the innocence of youth proclaimed that the good in men can outweigh the evil, and they have acted upon that assumption.

Note: Lin did note, interestingly, that there were occasions where war was unavoidable:
"Civil wars are necessary in a nation until an equilibrium is restored. Revolts against empires are necessary until the invader is driven out. The only stable equilibrium in the world is the equilibrium of equality. Only when such equilibrium is reached can we have peace. Small countries have the right to fight, perhaps to settle an old boundary dispute. Big countries have no right to fight, ever, because when they fight they involve the whole world.

Lin Yutang on "Big Neighbors":

...Of all the fifty or sixty nations in the world, only three or four big powers are upsetting the peace of the world. These powers have run over this earth, kicking down people's fences in bad temper and worse manners, robbing them of their liberty and independence, and taking possession of their goods and have then
fought wars among themselves for these goods. First they fought among themselves, and then they called upon the entire world to fight for them to keep what they have. This makes little sense, and it makes still less sense to say that we can have peace only by giving greater power to the big powers and disarming the small powers, on the plea that the small powers may combine to attack them!

Big Powers, at least behave as if you were not scared! But now we suddenly hear about policing the world, as if the Greenlanders and Samoans and Formosans and Burmese were threatening the world peace, while the big powers don their uniforms, strutting about to club the small powers on their heads with a baton if they do not behave. It would seem that we could well police the big powers for a while and leave the poor Samoans and Balinese and Eskimos alone. But, no, we cannot disarm the big powers, because the big powers will not be disarmed, after having so heroically fought and triumphed in this war. Very well, then, let's have wars eternally. The first thing we know the police will start shooting among themselves and scare us poor humble neighbors out of our wits.www.amoymagic.com